Navodaya students go on rampage, manhandle teachers

KATIHAR: Students of Navodaya Vidyalaya at Kolasi,8 km from Katihar created ruckus when they allegedly manhandled and even thrashed their teachers, pelted stones at their residential quarters and also vandalised school property all through past midnight on Monday.
Half-a-dozen teachers were injured in the stone-pelting incident, including Arvindam Pankaj who was referred to Patna, according to official sources.
Though they were apparently protesting against the extremely poor quality of food, slashing of provisions like soaps as well as the alleged ham-handedness of the principal, Chandra Bhushan Gupta, the agitating students main ire was the transfer of a temporary Hindi teacher Vandana Tiwari, who joined here only a month-and-half back. “The transfer of the temporary Hindi teacher was the handiwork of the principal,” they alleged.
“The principal generally abused us and also humiliated our guardians whenever they came,” protesting students alleged.
Police also had to bear the brunt of their ire when they reached the school campus which was littered with stones and broken furniture , police said. The students were pacified only after DM Prakash Kumar and SP reached the school campus around mid-day on Tuesday.
Katihar DM Prakash Kumar, talking to TOI on Tuesday, said the boys and girls were extremely angry over the poor quality and slashing of quantum of food. “Though the protesting students neither talked about the transfer of Hindi teacher nor gave any such thing in writing, the crux of their agitation was teacher’s transfer,” he told.
The principal, on his part, put the blame squarely on the Hindi teacher who, he alleged before local newsmen, engineered all this.